The Myth of the Well
by Julia Mae
Summary: The knights are sent on an order about a old myth. But Tristan learns that perhaps, some myths are more true than you think...


I got completely inspired to write this fic by song lyrics. "Old Well" by the band Demether. I say, if you read the lyrics and then my fic, you will definitely see some parallels between it. (:

And, please excuse any inaccuracies to the film that may be in there.

* * *

It was ridiculous. Such a thing could not be true. All the Sarmatian knights and their commander Arthur could not understand why they were given such a strange order. The most disapproved of them all was Tristan.  
"We should be dealing with actual warfare, not investigating an old myth which is not even true," he muttered to himself. But no one had heard him...like usual.  
The order was this: there was a small town Eastwards, much in the middle of nowhere. But it was still a part of the Roman Empire, so they still sent aid to the townspeople whenever they called for it.  
Somehow, mysteriously, the townspeople were disappearing, dying, one by one. There was no plague, nor any famine. The people still ate well. So, a few simple Roman soldiers were sent to survey the little town. But after a month, they had still not returned.  
The townspeople there blamed it on the old well. Near the town, a little ways into the woods, there stood a very old well. No one could remember when it was first built there. And an eerie myth surrounded this well.  
It was always dry. No water could ever be drawn from it. However, the myth says...that if you come to the well before dawn, in the late hours of nighttime, then you will be able to drink out of the well. And the water will be the most refreshing water you have ever dranken.  
However, the spirit within the well will pull you down...you'll crash and fall to the bottom, and lay there to rest for eternity.  
Of course, it all sounds like well,...nothing more than a silly myth. But those townspeople believed every last word of it.  
"We're cursed by the spirit in the well!" They would say.

So now Arthur and his knights were sent there to learn what had become of those Roman soldiers, and to see how true the myth of the well was. But deep inside, all the knights believed that it was just a myth, and nothing more.  
"This is a waste of time!" Galahad said a bit crossly, as they rode their way there. "I don't see why we were assigned on such an order!"  
"Frightened?" Gawain said with a sly smile.  
"Of course not!" The moody knight retorted.  
"I know it's a bit strange," Arthur said. "But it is our order and we must see it through."  
Soon, they came upon the town. It truly was a...eerie, unwelcoming place. It was surrounded by a thick forest whose trees were dead and looked like gray ash smoke. The town was deathly silent as they came upon the edge of it now.  
The people were ghosts. Those who were working outside at the moment stopped and eyed the knights with uncertainty. A pale man came forward to them.  
"More Roman soldiers?" He said warily.  
"Yes, we were sent to see what had become of the other two soldiers who were here last," Arthur spoke.  
"Oh, them..." The man's pale face grew even more pale.  
"Are they still here?"  
"...You know the myth of our town?"  
"Yes..."  
"The well-spirit has made them its victims. Their bones lie at the bottom of the well now."  
Arthur sighed and dismounted from his horse. The frail main stepped back a step.  
"Where is the well?" asked Arthur.  
"Just over there..." The man pointed towards where the forest opened up. "You go completely straight a few yards in, and there the well sits."  
Arthur turned to his knights behind him now, and said to their scout, "Tristan, go see if there really is a well."  
Tristan wanted to protest saying that the whole matter was completely idiotic, but he only obeyed orders and silently left.

_"This is the oddest scouting mission I've ever gotten,"_ Tristan thought to himself. He, of course, didn't believe in the myth. Usually on any normal order, he would be able to loose arrows upon the enemies whoever they may be, or cleave them with his long curved sword. But...this order didn't have any of that. It was rather dull, and uninteresting. Yes it was...different.  
Twilight was zoning as Tristan entered into the wood. There was no clear path for him to be able to ride on. It was a tangle of brushes and thorns and other plants. It was the loneliest forest he had ever been in. Normally, woods are peaceful and at ease. Tristan knew that well. But not these woods. Dark and silent. Dead.  
He drew his sword and cut his way through the annoying tangles. He went completely straight in.  
"Cutting branches!" he scoffed. "Never thought I'd be putting my blade to such work."  
After a few moments, he finally came upon it. The well. The old well where a spirit supposedly dwelled within. Oddly enough, no plants grew near the well. It could be seen clearly in the dying sun rays.  
The grass it stood upon was withered.  
Tristan peered down into the well. It looked bottomless, just like an abyss.  
"Spirit..." He mumbled, turning his dark eyes away. "It's incredible how this little well can scare so many people..."  
He spotted a rope hanging down into the dark well. He pulled it up, and there appeared a bucket. But...it was dry like a desert.

When he had returned back to the town, he reported to Arthur bluntly,  
"Yeah there is a well there all right. And only a well."  
"You didn't see the spirit?" Lancelot joked. Now Gawain and Dagonet suddenly walked up, reporting,  
"We searched everywhere but there was no sign of the two missing soldiers."  
"They could have just run off," said Lancelot.  
"Abandoning their duty to Rome...I wonder if any soldier would be so rash as that," Gawain said.  
"Well, Tristan found the well," Arthur said. "So that does exist. About the myth...all the elder says is that they were taken by the well-spirit...and many of their citizens before them."  
"They say the spirit is a man," Dagonet began saying. "Who was heading east, but stopped at the well to rest for the night. He was dying of thirst, and he was sure this well would have water. But when he threw the bucket down and drew it back up, it was dry. He cursed the well, and crazed by his thirst, he threw himself down there to see if there really was any water. 'His soul still lingers thirsty...the well which will never quench his thirst.'"  
"This is ridiculous!" Lancelot suddenly snapped angrily. "Arthur, we have no time for this. Let them believe in a silly old story. We'll just report back that the soldiers were nowhere to be found."  
"I agree with him," sighed Gawain. Arthur thought to himself for a moment.  
"The elder said that the two went to the well during the night to verify the myth," he spoke. "I'd like to do the same. Only one of us though."  
"You're not saying you believe it?!" Galahad exclaimed.  
"Okay, so who?" Gawain asked.  
And...in the end, they chose Tristan. Firstly, because it would be dark and he already knew the location of the well.  
Secondly, because he was the scout and the most familiar with a forest better than any of them.  
Tristan had no objections. Though he did not say it out loud, he was very curious just to see how true this myth really was...

It was already dark; the sun had lowered fully in the sky. Tristan wasn't exactly thrilled about having to make his way through the path he had cut earlier and sit watch upon the well. Arthur had instructed he need not stay long, and all the other knights passed pity to him for this task he must do.  
Tristan did not accept their pity though.  
The old well glowed in the faint moonlight. Like last time, he walked up to the well and peered deeply into it. Nothing but blackness. He placed one hand upon the well's edge...and strangely, it felt wet, as if newly sprinkled with water.  
_"It's only dew from the cold night."_ He concluded. Soon though, as he looked deeper into the well, he thought he saw something glimmer. Like water!  
At first he thought it was only his eyes fooling him. He walked onto the other side of the well and saw there was the rope loosely hanging like earlier.  
Out of curiosity, he grabbed the rope again and began heaving it up by the pulley it was attached to. It creaked...it creaked quietly...until he had finally drawn it all the way up. The bucket. The bucket was still tied to the end of the rope. Tristan expected it to be an empty bucket like it was before, but...no! It was filled with water now.  
_"The myth says that the well is always dry, except at night,"_ He said to himself _"And those who drink it..."_  
He wasn't of course starting to wonder if the myth was true. He still believed that it was most certainly not.  
As he touched the tips of his fingers into the well water, something strange happened. Now Tristan thought his eyes were truly deceiving him! It looked like children all in white had surrounded him. They glowed like white fire, even brighter than the full moon itself.  
Whispers...they were whispering...in their ring around the well, and around Tristan himself.  
The knight was not superstitious. Far from it. And as he experienced this paranormal situation, he felt no fear at all. Because, he believed it was not happening at that minute, at that second.  
Tristan wanted to face the myth and prove it did not exist. So he raised the semi-filled bucket to his lips and drank. The water...was truly the most cool and refreshing he had ever dranken.  
_"And now the spirit comes!"  
_But Tristan wasn't going to be taken down by any paranormal spirit ghost to be thrown to the bottom of the well! The water rose above the well, it flowed over the sides of it, flooding the ground. The children's whispering became louder...and Tristan grimaced. He remained undaunted.  
A whisper louder and clearer than the rest began to speak now. He assumed it was the well-spirit's:  
_"Those who peer into my waters, see their heart's desire. Consumed with greed and blinded by it, their sense becomes lost...and they jump, to grab that they want most."_  
But when the scout peered into the well, he saw nothing. For he had no heart's desire. Therefore, he did not reach for it - the illusion in the water - and thus fall to his doom.  
He was not taken by the well-spirit, and it knew this.  
The whispering stopped. The white children faded into the woods. The water fell back down into the well. Tristan was alone in the hollow forest. He was one of those few people who have the skill to defeat a spirit. And the bucket was dry, as if no water had ever wettened it.

When Tristan returned to the town at the dead of night, all of the knights asked him if anything unusual had occurred.  
"Yes, there's a spirit in the well all right," He said seriously, with a straight face.  
"Come now," said Bors. "Report seriously."  
For the fun of it, Tristan wanted to reply, "I am." but instead...he only said,  
"There's nothing. Just a well."  
He did not want to tell anyone of his experience because, well,...they would not believe him.  
The two missing Roman soldiers were concluded as "missing" and as "deserters." But it's strange. No sign or trace of them was ever seen again in Britain, Rome, or any of the surrounding countries.  
The knights left that same morning, letting the townspeople to continue their believing of the ancient myth. Tristan didn t know if he believed it. He did, and he didn't.  
"You have to see it to believe it."  
That phrase seemed so true to him now, and made perfect sense. See and believe. And he had.


End file.
